The Fall of BlackBerry Land

“BlackBerria exhibits all the classic signs of a collapsing country. Today, it’s the kind of place that might compel the State Department to issue a travel advisory. It’s a land where crime goes unpunished, where fires burn unextinguished, where citizens wander the streets alive but dazed, where the future is too foggy to inspire any feeling but despondency…

“[There is] an inability to interact with other states as a full member of the international community. Relations with Instagram, for example, appear to have broken down beyond repair. Some blame its loss of stature in the international community on trade imbalance: In recent years it had stopped manufacturing many of its most venerable products in favor of unproven imports. Foreign investors, however, have pulled out en masse…

“Though it’s cold comfort for old-line BlackBerrians, the country — among the most ancient in the world — will leave a legacy. It was first in so many things, bolstered but ultimately doomed by its inward cultural focus and tendency for isolationism, which will spare surrounding countries from the most severe externalities. Other nations will treat it with wistful dignity in their history books and move on.

“Rest assured: BlackBerria’s citizens will be safe. But their country will disappear, and soon they will have no choice but to leave.”